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Liz Truss has echoed the language of former US president Donald Trump as she called on her party to “make Britain grow again”.

The ex-prime minister, who was ousted from Number 10 after just 44 days following her disastrous mini-budget, made the remark when appearing at a packed out fringe event at the Conservative Party conference.

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She said her successor, Rishi Sunak, had made “some progress” in recent weeks, with the watering down of the government’s net zero targets.

But she said he and the chancellor needed to “do more” because “it’s Conservative solutions, it’s Conservative arguments that are popular with the public, but it’s also those arguments that are going to deliver”.

Queues snaked around the Midland Hotel in Manchester to get into the event, with key figures of the right in attendance – from Tory former ministers like Dame Priti Patel and Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg to former Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage.

Liz Truss was greeted my throngs of fans as she appeared at a fringe event in Manchester.
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Liz Truss was greeted by throngs of fans as she appeared at a fringe event in Manchester – pic: Tim Baker

With the discussion hosted by a GB News journalist, Ms Truss began her speech by praising the beleaguered channel, which has hit the headlines over the past week after misogynistic comments on air led to three presenters being suspended.

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“In my view, we need more economic journalism and we need more GB News challenging the orthodoxy, broadcasting common sense and transforming our media landscape, so long may it continue,” she said.

Moving onto her main message, the former leader said it was up to the government to “make life easier and better for families across our land”, claiming there were three things they could do now to “really change the agenda – “axing the tax, cutting the bills and building the homes”.

With tax, Ms Truss reiterated her call to reduce corporation tax to 19% – a move she attempted in her short tenure that led to market turmoil – saying: “What we know is that economic growth and making Britain grow again is not going to be delivered by the Treasury, it’s not going to be delivered by more public spending.

“It’s going to be delivered by giving businesses the freedom they need to succeed.”

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To cut bills, she revived her previous policy to drill for shale gas in the UK – despite questions over its safety and effectiveness – saying: “Some will say using our own gas is not environmentally friendly, but how environmentally friendly is it to rely on regimes abroad, who often have very poor records for our gas, to ship that gas into the United Kingdom, often at both environmental cost and financial?

“We are sitting on 50 years worth of sustainable gas. Can you imagine if we unleash that, what that would mean for households, what that would mean for businesses?”

Former British Prime Minister Liz Truss speaks on stage at Britain's Conservative Party's annual conference in Manchester, Britain, October 2, 2023. REUTERS/Hannah McKay

And on building homes, Ms Truss called for a 500,000 a year target to be met, adding: “That won’t just mean people will find it easier to get into a home.

“People will find it easier to start a family because there will be more affordable housing. Employers will find it easier to employ people somewhere because their workers can afford homes.

“It will also save the government money…. because we will cut our housing benefit bill [and] we won’t need to intervene so much in the housing market because we are making the prices cheaper and that is fundamental to what these reforms should be about.”

She conceded her plans were “not necessarily easy for us to do”, but added: “We need to be prepared to do the difficult things because that is what will make Britain grow again.”

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‘Bring it on’: Left-wing activists gather for fight back against the right – and Labour

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'Bring it on': Left-wing activists gather for fight back against the right - and Labour

The World Transformed, a left-wing political festival, has historically ran alongside the Labour Party Conference as an unofficial fringe event.

But a lot has changed since it began in 2016, organised then by the Corbyn-backed group Momentum. And like the former Labour leader himself, TWT has gone independent.

From Thursday to Sunday, a programme of politics, arts and cultural events will be held in Manchester, a week after Labour’s annual party gathering ended.

“It no longer made any sense to be a fringe festival of the Labour conference,” Hope Worsdale, an organiser since 2018, tells Sky News. “We need a space for the independent left to come together.”

This decision was made before the formation of Your Party in July and the surge of support behind the Greens and its new leader Zack Polanski, but both these factors have given TWT some extra momentum. Organisers say it is not just a festival, but a “statement of intent from the British left” – and a left that looks different from how it used to.

Previous headline speakers were Labour MPs in the left-wing Socialist Campaign Group, and in 2021, the showstopper was American democrat Bernie Sanders calling in live for an event alongside John McDonnell.

The World Transformed, previously headlined left-wing Labour MPs
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The World Transformed, previously headlined left-wing Labour MPs

Bernie Sanders and John McDonnell in conversation at TWT in 2021
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Bernie Sanders and John McDonnell in conversation at TWT in 2021

This year, Mr Polanski, Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana are the only British politicians due to speak at events – though Brian Leishman, who lost the Labour whip in the summer, is also scheduled on a panel.

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TWT was put on pause last year for organisers to reflect upon its role going forward, after Sir Keir Starmer’s election victory.

In 2021, 2022 and 2023, while he was leader of the opposition, the festival was able to “co-exist” with Labour as a space for activists on the left to discuss ideas.

But the prime minister’s “shift to the right” has alienated so many of those grassroots members that it was felt TWT’s core audience would no longer be at Labour Party conferences, says Hope, who joined Labour in the Corbyn years and has since left.

TWT in 2016. Pic: TWT
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TWT in 2016. Pic: TWT

Event at TWT in 2023
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Event at TWT in 2023

“Our official position isn’t that Labour is dead and no one should engage with it,” she says.

“But they have shifted the values of Labour so radically since the last election, broken promise after promise, attacked civil liberties… there’s been such a suite of terrible decisions that mean people who are generally progressive and generally left wing feel like they have to take their organising elsewhere.”

So what’s on the cards?

There will be 120 events held in Hulme, Manchester, from Thursday to Sunday evening.

At the heart of the programme is daily assemblies, which organisers say are “designed to hold genuinely constructive debates about what we should do and how we should do it”.

But there’s just as much partying as there is politics – Dele Sosimi and his Afrobeat Orchestra are headlining the Saturday night slot while a “mystery guest” will host what TWT calls its “infamous” pub quiz on Friday night.

Back in 2018 that was Ed Miliband’s job, when 10,000 activists were expected to attend TWT. This year, organisers anticipate around 3,000 people will gather, but those involved insist this is a real chance for the left to strategise and co-ordinate, given the involvement of over 75 grassroots groups, trade unions, and activist networks.

Collaboration ‘vital’

A key question the left will need to address is how it can avoid splitting the vote given the rise of the Greens, socialist independents and the formation of Your Party,

One activist from the We Deserve Better organisation, which is campaigning for a left-wing electoral alliance and will be at TWT this weekend, acknowledged collaboration is “vital” if the left is to make gains under Britain’s first-past-the-post system.

Jeremy Corbyn at TWT. Pic: Reuters
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Jeremy Corbyn at TWT. Pic: Reuters

But it remains to be seen whether Your Party co-leaders Mr Corbyn and Ms Sultana can even work together following their public spat last month, let alone with other parties. The pair put on a united front at a rally in Liverpool on the eve of TWT, when Sultana said she was “truly sorry” and promised “no more of that”. But will the truce last?

“It’s not ideal”, says the activist. “Hopefully they are back on track…a lot of collaboration is happening at the grassroots and we need to make sure it’s formalised so we can beat Labour and the right, we need to put on united front.”

They point to seats like Ilford North, where Health Secretary Wes Streeting clung on by a margin of just 528 votes in the general election, after a challenge from British-Palestinian candidate Leanne Mohamad, who ran in protest against Labour’s stance on Gaza.

Meanwhile, in Hackney, the Greens are hoping to gain their first directly elected mayor next May, with the Hackney Independent Socialist Group of councillors throwing their weight behind the party’s candidate, Zoe Garbett.

The We Deserve Better activist says Labour’s “hostile war on the left” has made these areas ripe for the taking, and what is more important than party affiliation is galvanising momentum behind one candidate who shares socialist values on issues like public ownership and immigration – be they the Greens, independents, or Your Party.

“The World Transformed reflects a general reorientation of the left outside of Labour. If they are taking these places for granted, we are going to win. If we unite as the left then we can win even bigger. Bring it on.”

Is Labour in danger?

There is some cause for Labour to be worried. It is haemorrhaging votes to both the right and the left after a tumultuous first year in office (13% to Reform UK, 10% to the Greens and 10% to the Lib Dems, according to an Ipsos poll in September).

Many Labour MPs feel the prime minister has spent too much energy trying to “out Reform Reform” with a focus on immigration, and he needs to do more to win back moderate and progressive voters that will be gathering at TWT this weekend.

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Starmer’s ‘anti-Reform party’ gamble

One fed-up MP told Sky News it was a shame TWT had decided to branch away from Labour, but not a surprise.

“This was something that was on the cards for a while, a parting of the ways, it’s another thing to show what’s happening with the direction of the party.”

He said in previous years the festival “was full of people for the first time in their life who were excited about politics and had a leadership looking at how it could challenge the biggest issues in our country”.

“Debates could be heated but it was always a place for intellectual discussion and that inside the Labour Party is now dead.”

But he said the party ultimately had bigger things to worry about than TWT, with a budget round the corner and potentially catastrophic local elections in May.

“I don’t think it will keep Keir Starmer or Morgan McSweeney up at night.”

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Privacy group urges Ireland to drop work on encryption ‘backdoor law’

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Privacy group urges Ireland to drop work on encryption ‘backdoor law’

Privacy group urges Ireland to drop work on encryption ‘backdoor law’

The Irish Communications Interception and Lawful Access Bill is still in development, with drafting yet to occur, but the Global Encryption Coalition wants it scrapped now.

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Palestine Action ban must be explained, Labour peer tells Starmer

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Palestine Action ban must be explained, Labour peer tells Starmer

Ministers must do “much more” to explain why Palestine Action is a proscribed terrorist group, Harriet Harman has said.

Speaking to the Sky News Electoral Dysfunction podcast, the Labour peer said the government looked like it was just “arresting octogenarian vicars who are worried about the awful situation in Gaza”.

Baroness Harman, who was a Labour MP from 1982 to 2024, said the government had a “number of incredibly important duties” with regard to the war in Gaza – including protecting the Jewish community while also permitting free speech.

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She said that as well as ensuring the safety of Jewish venues, such as schools and synagogues, the government also needed to “try and create an atmosphere where the Jewish people should not feel that they are under threat and be asking themselves whether this is the right country for them to live in and be bringing up their families”.

Baroness Harman went on: “They also have to support and uphold the right to free speech and the right of protest. And people have felt so horrified.

“We all have about the devastating loss of life and suffering in Gaza. And so it’s right that people are allowed to protest.”

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A number of protests in support of Palestine Action have been organised in recent months following the group’s proscription under anti-terrorism laws in July, after members targeted RAF Brize Norton and damaged two military aircraft.

Protests against the British government's ban on Palestine Action
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Protests against the British government’s ban on Palestine Action

Last week, there were calls for the demonstrations to be halted following the attack on Heaton Park Synagogue in Manchester, in which two people were killed – but a number took place across the country, including in London.

The Labour peer said the organisers of such protests had a responsibility not to allow people to support a “terrorist organisation” but that the government also needed to do “much, more more” to explain why Palestine Action had been proscribed.

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“At the moment, it just looks like the police are arresting octogenarian vicars who are worried about the awful situation in Gaza,” Baroness Harman said.

“So they’ve got to actually be much clearer in why Palestine Action is a terrorist group and that they’re justified in prescribing them and making them illegal.

“But also the police have got to police those marches in stopping them being about the spouting of hatred and inciting violence, with people talking about globalising the intifada, which basically means killing all Jewish people.

“And the police do actually have very wide-ranging powers, not just to arrest people, but to actually ban marches.

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